


wax/wane

by boychik



Category: Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
Genre: Angst, Gen, Vampires, survivor's guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-05
Updated: 2017-09-05
Packaged: 2018-12-24 12:32:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12012807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/boychik/pseuds/boychik
Summary: It is late at night. Kurogane is sleeping, his face oddly softened in repose. Though Fai should be used to it after many nights in shared quarters, it’s still slightly uncanny to see him with brow and breath off-guard.





	wax/wane

**Author's Note:**

  * For [JordannaMorgan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JordannaMorgan/gifts).



It is late at night. Kurogane is sleeping, his face oddly softened in repose. Though Fai should be used to it after many nights in shared quarters, it’s still slightly uncanny to see him with brow and breath off-guard. A slice of moonlight cuts across the futon from the space between curtain and windowpane, illuminating a slice of his face and a glint of the blade he keeps tucked beside the bed. He looks so calm mainly deanimated like this, like a wax figurine of Kurogane. Unlike wax, however, there is a glint of life. Fai’s eyes drift to the holes in Kurogane’s arm. Even his strong flesh is getting bruised from overuse. Fai feels a pang of guilt looking at the unhealed wounds, even as his stomach growls. Always wanting more blood...perhaps the most honest expression of himself these days, pathetic as that is.

Sakura and Syaoran are sleeping soundly in the room adjacent. At times like these Fai also finds it comforting to consider Soel and Larg. Sometimes he sees Mokona sleeping and it is so honest, so pure. Her dreams are clearly written across her face. Fai imagines she shares not only words but dreams with her counterpart. Together, perhaps, they go on adventures, unmarred by the vagaries of clones or incessant feather-chasing or painful swaths of acid rain separating clothes from flesh...They are the perfect communicators. When Mokona twitches in her sleep, Fai visualizes the clear channel of communication between Soel and Larg interrupted. A blip in the system. Black and white. If only it were that easy with his traveling companions.

Soel and Larg are far apart, but don’t hide information from each other. Fai and Kurogane are close, but they do. Despite Fai’s constant nicknames for Kurogane, he knows it is just another way to create an illusion of closeness. He can’t keep him at a distance much longer, but now more than ever he needs to try. After this last battle, seeing Kurogane, he knows strength. And he knows that is not what he himself has to offer. Fai is learning that his smile cannot heal others. Sakura and Syaoran are withdrawing into darker places day by day. He can’t spill cute nicknames from his lips anymore--Kuro-puu, Kuro-pon, Kuro-pichi!--that desperate, superficial wish to become closer without being understood. Without being truly known.

Kurogane is the only reason he is still alive. He listens to his even breath, watches Kurogane’s heavy chest rise and fall. The past doesn’t matter, Kurogane had said. What untold traumas he had lived through and repressed to think that way? But now, after that battle, the present is almost as bad as the past. How could Kurogane tie himself to Fai this way, to put his life above what it was worth? Fai closed his eye. Dependent on Kurogane forever... He couldn’t call it a selfish act, exactly, but something about it turns his stomach. He is now living as a disgusting being...

It is shameful and sad to behave as he does. The compulsion for blood overriding any desire for himself and Kurogane to continue existing as normal, autonomous beings without this sick one-sided give and take. Kurogane never treated Fai or his vampirism as disgusting. But what did he want from this point onward? For Fai to accept vampirism emphatically, to go forth without regret or disgust? If the situation were reversed, Fai would be willing to give up his wrist morning and evening for Kurogane. Fai knows sacrifice, and Kurogane has sacrificed more than anyone for Fai. But the situation is not reversed. The situation is not reversed because Kurogane never put himself in the position Fai has, and never would. Kurogane would have killed Ashura-ou, not bind him and let him sleep soundly. If Kurogane knew what Fai had done, would he find his actions compassionate or merely foolhardy and weak?

In some ways, they were the same. They had both killed. But Kurogane killing enemies in service of his queen or in protection of his companions was different. Different from sending his own baby brother, his innocent flesh and blood, tumbling from the tower to die. Different from a life of lying about who he was. Who he is. Each dimension makes his past feel less escapable, like no matter how far they go or what they see or who they fight he is the same selfish, miserable bastard to the core.

They are discrete. He doesn’t want the children to see what he’s become. Syaoran grows more desperate as Sakura’s suffering grows more apparent. But he worries that no matter what he says, no matter what bright mask he puts up, they’ll know the truth about who he is. What he is. How and why he remains his brother’s killer, and Kurogane’s parasite.

He doesn’t want others to know the details of who he is. But he can’t hide everything anymore. When he feeds, as he must, he is telegraphing some of the most intimate information to Kurogane. The way he takes Kurogane’s hand in his own and feels its weight, comforting despite his own disquieting vampirism. The way he pierces Kurogane’s skin, taking only what he needs and no more...but sometimes, a little more. The way he almost can’t bear to look into Kurogane’s eyes anymore. Not the eyes of prey, but the eyes of someone unfairly affirming and totally lacking of selfishness. Those dark eyes see him stripped of half his magic, and they gaze on, and they gaze on as Fai drinks blood from his arm... Could his manner betray his secrets in some subtle untold way?

The sun is rising on Fai’s sleepless night. There is no telling where their journey would end. How long would Kurogane stay by his side? Would they continue to travel together through multiple worlds? Fai can picture them spiriting on through air and clouds, in hellscapes, in jungles and rivers...slicing enemies by daylight, drinking blood by moonlight. The same shared moment repeats itself daily, but it never gets old. Would Kurogane follow Fai to Celes too, red blood dropping on white snow? Fai imagines himself over and over, reduced to a mouth, feeding like a young child. They are not much like predator and prey, but like symbiotic lifeforms tumbling through space and time. It’s not something he deserves, but he has to accept it, at least for now. He is Kurogane’s and Kurogane is his.

**Author's Note:**

> It was lovely to return to Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles, the series that jumpstarted my lifelong love of CLAMP. I always thought that whether their relationship is interpreted as romantic or gen in nature, Fai and Kurogane have an extremely intimate bond. JordannaMorgan's prompt about the sacrifices Kurogane made for Fai inspired me because when Kurogane saves Fai's life and Fai becomes a vampire, their connection deepens even as they are tested. CLAMP codes a lot of things and I wanted to explore a platonic side of longing and belonging. Fai goes to a very dark place in canon and I wanted to portray how Kurogane's caring sacrifices supported Fai enough to emerge from pure self-hatred.


End file.
